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True Cinnamon

by LeNell Camacho Santa Ana

on 11/12/13 at 01:00 PM

My daughter has learned from a nursery rhyme that little girls are made of sugar and spice and everything nice. I'm not so sure she is made of sugar and spice, but pies, cakes, cookies, and beverages seem more festive with the addition of sugar and cinnamon spice during the winter holidays. People even decorate their homes at the end of the year with bundled quills of cinnamon for a lovely aroma to stimulate the senses and induce feelings of merriment. Cinnamon seems to be the spice of the holiday season.

Cinnamon has been used to flavor food and drinks for hundreds of years. Some even believed ages ago that the spice could help cure snakebites, freckles, and the common cold. As the spice grew in popularity, of course cheaper, less refined versions became more commonly available.

Most of what you find in grocery stores in stick and powdered variety is Chinese or Indonesian cassia labeled as "cinnamon." Cassia is less less delicate in flavor and less expensive. The sticks are thick and rough.

Ceylon cinnamon--cinnamomum verum--is considered the true cinnamon. Preferred in Mexico and Europe, Ceylon cinnamon comes from the inner, thin layers of bark from the cinnamon tree native to Sri Lanka. True cinnamon is more easily ground in a spice grinder or in a mortar and pestle than the thicker cassia bark which can sometimes even tear up your electric grinders.

You cannot easily tell fine, ground cinnamon from cassia merely by looking at it. The sticks are easier to differentiate. If you look at the stick--or quill--of true cinnamon next to cassia, you will see that true cinnamon sticks have multiple thin layers. Cassia labeled as cinnamon looks like a one-piece, thick roll of bark.

If your local grocery does not carry true cinnamon, try shopping for it in an herb shop or Latin grocery.

You mentioned people who place bundles of it in their house. I'm glad to say I know of no one who would place those foul smelling bundles of toxicity in their houses. I don't mind a little cinnamon (or cassia) to spice up a dish, but those bundles are overpowering allergy factories to some of us. Please stick to cooking with the spice, not decorating with it!